Arrival and Move-In

08/31/18

    Well now, here I am in Taiwan. Now, you may be wondering about the strange time skip in the dates. That is because I essentially lost a day to timezone. I’m a bonafide time traveler! And also I might have been waaaaay too tired to write anything when I did arrive.
     I made it off the airplane, picked up my luggage without issue (it was there within the first few minutes!), picked up my temporary sim card, and headed out to get a taxi. The ride took a while, apparently high density cities are prone to traffic… But after probably an hour, I was outside my hotel. As usual when I am tired, it took longer than it should to find the entrance to my hotel with three suitcases. People were giving such looks, as I was taking up most of the side walk trying to figure out where I ought to be. Once I saw the neon sign and got into the elevator, I met the receptionist, Lu Yuhua (盧育華), who looked terrified as an American spilled out into her lobby with a stupid number of bags for a one night stay. Though when she realized Chinese wasn’t an issue we quickly went from strangers to friends. We talked for probably a good 30 minutes before she took me up to my room. Once in the room it was a shower and fall into a dead sleep kind of situation. I honestly remember letting people know I was alive and well, then darkness.
    Five in the morning rolled around and due to my wondrous time change, I was wide awake. I futzed about into the hotel room for a little while, and talked with people back home. There’s a fifteen hour difference between the West coast and Taiwan, so mornings and evenings are roughly reversed. I went out and got coffee. My stomach wasn’t really up for food, I always ave a had time after travel getting my body to settle down. I checked out, said goodbye to Yuhua, who has promised that we will see one another. And took an Uber over to my new apartment. And because it’s me I once more underestimated how long it was going to take, which means I was 30 minutes late to meet the Borderless house representative. Justin (the person I met), was actually very nice about the whole thing. We went over the contract, then exchanged money, and -poof- I am living in my new place. To explain my living situation, I am staying in a share house. Essentially, it’s a bunch of transient people all living together staying and moving on as they need to. Most of the housing is multiples to a room, however, I insisted on getting a single room. I am too old to be living dorm style.
    Moving in was pretty easy, I unpacked the suitcases, made my bed, and got connected up to the internet. I won’t be getting any new housing things until I go to Ikea tomorrow with Cassidy, so this night is essentially another hotel night. I ran out and got a quick lunch of spicy cold noodles (麻辣涼麵) and bread. I need to go to the store and buy basic amenities, but it’s raining and the one thing I forgot to pack as I left for this island in the middle of the tropics? An umbrella… I’m hoping it will let up for little bit so I can run out buy said item along with some food to cook for the next day or so.
    I’ve met two of my flatmates so far(I could potentially have up to eight other people in the house). One is from Vietnam, she speaks Chinese––I think? It’s really unclear I tried speaking with her and asked her a few questions and her answers were strange, or she switched into a pigeon English. So….Who knows? It’s also possible she just doesn’t want to talk with me, which fair enough. The second flatmate is Taiwanese and he seems friendly enough. He is also attending NTU, so we’ll probably end up seeing one another often enough.
    Went to the closest market, it left something to be desired. I am going to fan out my search a see what else is there. New York city spoiled me a little bit, having my grocery store within a five minute walk makes the ten to fifteen minute walk seem like ages. Also I still don’t really know the area so everything seems to take longer than it actually does. Once I know the area better it won’t seem so strange wandering around. Jet lag is catching up to me so I’m gonna go to sleep a little early. Ikea adventures tomorrow!